Love riding my 456Carbon on downhill trails- biggest things I would ensure are a short stem with wide bars (looks like thats already ticked with the stock spec though!). I have a 40mm stem, 760mm bars.

Having some form of chain retention is useful so you don't end up having to put the chain back on after every run (clutch mech/chainguide/narrowide chainring).

As said above, decent tires work. I like my high rollers as they work well all year round. You really need to lean them over to get their cornering grip though (I think the short stem/wide bars helps with this!).

It's pretty much set to go as it is.

I recently got a dh bike- rode my 456 at wharnecliffe one week followed by the dh bike the week after. I was obviously faster on my dh bike, but I had a lot more fun on the 456...

Super wide bars? Short stem? Double ring? Nah, first thing i'd change are those forks. They're not really up to DH duties at all unless you're very, light and/or very slow.

I've beefy 36 Fox (talas) on my 456SS with 720mm bars, 70mm stem and run 1x10 (with superstar plasma guide - no bash) and it's works pretty good as a DH hardtail. Beauty of the Talas is i can also use it for general xc/trails too.

I did a lot of downhill on my 456 summer season but got fed up of it being slower and sold it for a reign. The build will be fine, just dual ply tyres. A muddy mary in 2.5" on the front will give you tonnes of confidence and a generic minion (f OR r) on the back is a great allround combo.

Hardtails are superb on the steep stuff as they respond so directly and can be thrown from catcher to catcher, but when you start hitting boulders you'll slow down a lot. Also it gets twitchy when you go very fast on techy turns etc. BUT, it's great fun and will scare the pants off you at times!

DH tyres make much more difference than dh tubes. Just buy tyres (try planet x for 20 quid ones) and see how you go. It's great chucking a hardtail on an uplift trailer.

im 12st so not exactly light, but never done a dh trail so i will bve going slow, and as said i dont wanna chuck tonnes of cash if i find its not my thing.

tyres or inner tubes etc, dropping seats, changing pedals etc i can and have done, sticking on uprated forks for now is a no go due to £ but will be something i will place on the list and obv be top of list should i decide to get stuck into it, as you say they prob wont be lasting too long with a) not being dh orientated and b) me being s*** so no doubt giving them some stick beyond what they designed to do!

my most local will be cannock, ill be joining a group with varying degrees of experience and exuberance... they did cannock today and doing forest of dean tomorrow and they will be spending a week in france somewhere in the summer so they take it reasonably seriously so i dare say they can give me some pointers and may even between them be able to chuck a 2nd hand bike my way between spare parts from each

i reckon what glasgowdan said re:tyres is a good start, planet x doing maxxis high rollers for 20 quid at the mo and i can hunt for some deals in meantime.

thanks all again for your input.... its proving not only an eye opener but also making me realise i can have a go on my 456 and not be completely ill equipped

sticking on uprated forks for now is a no go due to £ but will be something i will place on the list and obv be top of list should i decide to get stuck into it, as you say they prob wont be lasting too long with a) not being dh orientated and b) me being s*** so no doubt giving them some stick beyond what they designed to do!

It's not that the Revs wont last long - they're a decent fork for trail riding - but i found them to be a confidence vacuum on anything remotely DH, particularly in fast, rough corners (the kind of place where you really need to have a bit of faith in your kit - especially on a hard hardtail like the 456). I didn't dare hit any big jumps on them, they were just too twangy. I gave them 3 good weeks and that was enough. Swapped them for something else. And that's the thing. If they're new/nearly new you'd easily get enough to cover the cost of an older set of something chunkier, so not as expensive as you might think.

I've some pretty old (07) talas on mine 110-130-150 and i think they're perfect. With the 456's slack head angle you really don't need to go 150-160 for it to be capable DH and you have the option to make the bike very versatile (as shown below )

my most local will be cannock, ill be joining a group with varying degrees of experience and exuberance...

Stile Cop is ideal for learning on a hardtail - there's a good selection of easier tracks that don't require you to get massive amounts of air.
I've ridden about half of them on a hardtail and am actually quicker on some tracks than on my DH bike. Start on the Red and Ridge Run, then move onto CDL, Little Bringe, A&E and Wonderland. I'm up there quite a bit, so give us a shout if you want to be shown what's what.

I ride a lot of downhill on my ragley blue pig quite a lot and agree with most of the comments above, decent tyres set up tubeless on wide rims make a massive difference in grip and comfort, also important are a decent length bar, short stem and quality forks.

I say quality rather than stiff as I used to have evo level 32's on my ragley and hated them, mainly because they dived through their travel on berms and compressions, swapped them for a set of factory 32's made a massive difference, keeping the fork higher up in the travel made berms and steep sections a lot easier.

I'm only running 150 revs as I don't have much weight behind me, a measily 60kg... But they and the bike are more than capable, it's only me who bottles the proper big boys stuff, not the bike....

Running the 2.5" tyres at 15-18 psi was fine, when I pumped them up to 30psi for a section of road I did one day, I did have a few issues with the rear tyre rubbing on a only very slightly buckled wheel... Make sure your rear wheel is true and dished with 2.5's on as theres not much clearance!

Lol funny you should pop up stripe, it's your thread a while back when u bought yours just before you headed off to he alps that made me head off to Planet X/one one and get the 456 and on the Matt raw colour! I even sent my mate a pic of ur bike of that thread saying if I aim to setup like this (ur bike) I reckon I'll be ok!

Ha ha, well I had an awesome time on my 456 out in the alps, more than enough bike for morzine... The only thing I've changed for the uk/ trail centres are the tyres, now running 2.4" big Betty's the dual ply wicked will's were so heavy if you had to pedal anywhere!

Well I'm based near the centre of birmingham so my locals also Cannock so if you want a ride or head up there give me a shout,